I think reliability of the engines will be the big question for the new formula...but Renault do have plenty of experience in turbos! (as do Ferrari). At the end of the day I think their competitiveness, apart from reliability, will still come down to chassis...I hope to see some big improvements in that regard this year..

Renault have stated that they consider red bull their priority over anyone else, i thought that weird at the time as Renault was the previous guise of lotus, but i guess money and success talks loudest

Renault have stated that they consider red bull their priority over anyone else, i thought that weird at the time as Renault was the previous guise of lotus, but i guess money and success talks loudest

F1 is all about PR for the car manufacturers, they will make whoever is winning their team.

I'm sure if the Red Bull brand ever wanted out that Renault would buy the team.

Then the Honda rumours. Might be BS but Honda have a habit of developing things to new regs even if they aren't intending to carry them through. So who knows who they have been talking too if they are building one.

I hope Honda do its a chance for manufacturers to get in on the new regs before engines get properly bedded in i think there could be a be of a development race over the next few years getting the most out of them more established manufacturers the better as cosworth are likely dead in the water after this year.

:? F1 is slowly turning into Formula Renault. I wish there were more engine manufacturers present...

Ferrari, Mercedes, Renault, Honda, BMW and Toyota each supplying two teams would be perfect imo.

The problem is developing F1 engines to the extent that they are competitive is a very expensive business and they don't sell many units. I doubt there is a lot of money in it for a company like BMW, even taking the publicity into account.

If we aren't careful we will end up with garbage like Mechachrome, Asiatech and Playlife. Even the more recent Cosworth and Toyota engines were pretty poor.

This move has nothing to do with Renault actually. It is all about TR being RBR sister company.For next year when it is going to be complex design job for all teams to fit everything into totally different package, TR are not going to be doing their own work as they have done so far. They are going to use RBR gearboxes and other system (possibly hydraulics and electrical and other like KERS. ). They went on record to say that today. And this is mainly why they need to move to Renault as RBR is on renault. This makes it a lot of take it from here and put it there kinda deal between these two sister teams. Internals will be shared and just for technicality of rules, they will have 2 different chassis. But this is huge advantage to these two come next season as lot of key systems will be shared. This mean twice the data, double test bed, and double feedback.

Frankly there are plenty of other technical partnerships in F1 which mainly focus on 1 or 2 part sharing and resource rentals type of deals, but this is going well beyond that next year. FIA and FOM rather just allow customer cars if this is going to go on like this. Or put a complete ban on things like this which honestly is not going to help F1 in today'c economic climate where small teams simply do not have all resources to compete completely independently.

Strange to have most of the teams with Renault engines when we are constantly told that they are underpowered compared to Merc and Ferrari. Maybe it's just a cost issue? Maybe they're looking well placed for the 2014 regs?

This move has nothing to do with Renault actually. It is all about TR being RBR sister company.For next year when it is going to be complex design job for all teams to fit everything into totally different package, TR are not going to be doing their own work as they have done so far. They are going to use RBR gearboxes and other system (possibly hydraulics and electrical and other like KERS. ). They went on record to say that today. And this is mainly why they need to move to Renault as RBR is on renault. This makes it a lot of take it from here and put it there kinda deal between these two sister teams. Internals will be shared and just for technicality of rules, they will have 2 different chassis. But this is huge advantage to these two come next season as lot of key systems will be shared. This mean twice the data, double test bed, and double feedback.

Frankly there are plenty of other technical partnerships in F1 which mainly focus on 1 or 2 part sharing and resource rentals type of deals, but this is going well beyond that next year. FIA and FOM rather just allow customer cars if this is going to go on like this. Or put a complete ban on things like this which honestly is not going to help F1 in today'c economic climate where small teams simply do not have all resources to compete completely independently.

FIA's rule was always specific to complete car, even if parts were the same, as f1 always had engine suppliers since god knows when. that was my understanding of the rule you mentioned. teams with customer engines built their own gearboxes not because of regulation, but for competitive advantage.

Also the renault engine throughout last season was widely rumored to be on of the most fuel efficient in the paddock. Meaning less starting weight. However, that side of things will probably change drastically come 2014

This move has nothing to do with Renault actually. It is all about TR being RBR sister company.For next year when it is going to be complex design job for all teams to fit everything into totally different package, TR are not going to be doing their own work as they have done so far. They are going to use RBR gearboxes and other system (possibly hydraulics and electrical and other like KERS. ). They went on record to say that today. And this is mainly why they need to move to Renault as RBR is on renault. This makes it a lot of take it from here and put it there kinda deal between these two sister teams. Internals will be shared and just for technicality of rules, they will have 2 different chassis. But this is huge advantage to these two come next season as lot of key systems will be shared. This mean twice the data, double test bed, and double feedback.

Frankly there are plenty of other technical partnerships in F1 which mainly focus on 1 or 2 part sharing and resource rentals type of deals, but this is going well beyond that next year. FIA and FOM rather just allow customer cars if this is going to go on like this. Or put a complete ban on things like this which honestly is not going to help F1 in today'c economic climate where small teams simply do not have all resources to compete completely independently.

FIA's rule was always specific to complete car, even if parts were the same, as f1 always had engine suppliers since god knows when. that was my understanding of the rule you mentioned. teams with customer engines built their own gearboxes not because of regulation, but for competitive advantage.

Yes I know the rule, what I meant to say is that with this level of collaboration (or rather passing of parts and even dictating driver choice and top management decisions of other team ) happening and FIA's in ability to avoid clear sister team advantage on and off the track, it would be better if they just allowed customer cars again back into F1. This way we will see more quality cars on the track with some smaller teams running good fundamental chassis setup and competing much better than what we have seen from bottom 3 teams for last 3 years.

Personally I hate the TR and had more respect for HRT and still have more respect for Marussia and Caterham. TR is just becoming a puppet at this point. More blatant puppet as years go by.

[quote]RTR = READY TO RUN sounds like what the rc world calls cheap cars intended for little kids or novices.Fitting for a crap team like TR puppet team for RBR and vettel[quote]

Eh, not a very flattering to say about Toro Rosso but I guess they somewhat deserved it. Not that they had a chance of going another way around either. Let's not forget that before being Toro Rosso they were Minardi and with one leg in the grave, so historically they did make some progress from their roots. Anyway, what more can it be expected from a 2nd team, mix it up with the big boys upfront? that will only lead to more suspicion and conspiracy theories. I can only see how everybody would jump to the roof if, per say, a Toro Rosso would slow down at start a Ferrari, for RBR to catch up. IMO I like Toro Rosso exactly where they are now - at the back of the grid. This way, they can't play ball to big sister too much, except when lapped.

“I think one of the lovely things about Renault is they’re a very, very even-handed engine supplier”, “They will be delighted if all of their teams are fighting tooth and nail for pole position amongst one another and they genuinely don’t offer technical preference to one team over another.”

“Not only do they offer this even-handed approach, but they’re also extremely conscious of the fact that they need to make a car that works well in 2014, not an engine that works well, so they want they whole package to work.”, “So they are very considerate in asking the chassis people what we think is important and then trying to bring that to the engine. We certainly feel that we’re given lots of attention by Renault.”